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IV
As soon as Marie had got over her confinement, which
compelled her to live quietly for a time, she was seized
with a craving for excitement. Under the pretext of
studying her art, she visited the theatres and went to
public entertainments while I stayed at home and worked.
Protected by the title of a married woman, she was
received in circles which had been closed to the divorced
wife. She was anxious that I should accompany her, for
she considered the fact of her husband’s absence prejudicial
to her best interests. But I resisted, and while claiming
for myself personal freedom, according to our verbal
agreement, I allowed her absolute liberty, and let her go
where she pleased.
"But no one ever sets eyes on the husband," she
objected.
"People will understand him," I replied.
The husband ! The very way in which she pronounced
the word conveyed opprobrium ; and she fell into the
habit of treating me with a certain amount of super-
ciliousness.
During the solitary hours which I spent at home I
worked at my ethnographical treatise, which was to be
the ladder on which I hoped to climb to promotion at the
library. I was in correspondence with all the learned
authorities in Paris, Berlin, Petersburg, Irkutsk and
Peking, and, seated at my writing-table, I held in my
hand the threads of a perfect net of inter-relations which
stretched all over the world. Marie did not approve of
this work. She would have preferred to see me engaged
192
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